Annetje Jans

Annetje Jans (1605-1663) was a Dutch settler and landowner in New Netherland during the mid-17th century.

Biography
Annetje Jans was born in the Netherlands in 1605, and she was well-educated before marrying Roeloef Janssen. In 1630, she, her husband, their three daughters, her widowed mother, and her unmarried sister emigrated to the New Netherland colony in North America, settling in Fort Orange (Albany) before moving to the farming village of New Amsterdam on Manhattan. They acquired 62 acres of land along Broadway, Fulton, and Canal streets, and, after her husband died in 1636, she remarried to the Calvinist minister Dominie Bogardus in 1638. When her second husband died at sea in 1642, Jans added his estate to her considerable holdings, which became the "Bouwery Farm". When she died in 1663, her estate was divided among her many children and grandchildren, and it was later purchased by the Duke of York in 1670 and became a part of King's Farm.